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Welcome to Ratchet and Wrench Radio, produced by Endeavour Business Media, a division of
Endeavour B2B, bringing you strategies and inspiration for auto care success.
Welcome to Ratchet and Wrench Radio, the podcast helping independent auto repair shop owners
build stronger businesses. When we think about community involvement, it's often viewed
as something that's simply nice to do. A sponsorship here, a donation there, maybe volunteering at a
local event. But what if giving back could also become part of your business strategy?
Today's guest says it can. Adam Sutton, CEO of DX3 Brands and R&R Tire Express, has helped build a
culture where charitable giving isn't an occasional marketing campaign, it's a structured part of
the company's operating model. In 2025 alone, the R&R franchise system contributed more than 3.2
million to charitable initiatives while engaging communities across 30 states. Today, we're talking
about what independent shop owners can learn from that approach. We'll discuss how to choose the right
causes, create community programs that customers actually remember, involve their employees, and
turn authentic community engagement into stronger visibility, customer loyalty, and long-term growth.
Let's listen in.
Hi Adam, thanks so much for joining us today. Thank you for having me, honored to be here.
You're welcome. We are so excited today. We are talking about charitable giving. Now for those who
are not aware, R&R Tire Express has a very robust charitable giving campaign. Can you just start
off by telling us some of the causes that you guys contribute to? Sure, yeah. So we're a franchise
or of R&R Tire Express, 213 stores in 30 plus states, and now Canada as well. And so honored to say
that collectively as a whole, because it's important to our whole system and our franchisees, we gave
away over $3 million last year. And so it went all across the country into a lot of local communities.
We have a personal favorite that's close to home called the Declare No More Foundation. So we do a
lot with them, and they actually help other companies and organizations learn how to do it too. So
we kind of implemented them into our infrastructure to help our franchisees give back. And yeah,
it's been a real blessing. So let's kind of dial it back a little bit, because obviously this is part,
this is a big part of your business model. When did you first realize that philanthropy could be a
big part of your business strategy? Yeah, so I've never really looked at it as a business strategy
first. You know, we started it and I encourage our franchisees or anybody, our people, our store
managers to do it because we believe it's the right thing to do. Right? At the end of the day,
our ultimate desire is to be a company that gives more than we take, and philanthropy is a huge way
that we can do it. Over time, I think you realize that when you genuinely invest in people and local
communities, trusts, relationships, loyalty grows, and ultimately the business is going to grow along
with it. So it's a great byproduct of doing the right thing. So what's the difference between
structured giving and random giving? Well, I think random giving is good, right? It's reactive.
You're going to hear of needs that come up and you're going to respond and react to that. But I
think structured giving is intentional. It becomes, in our case, part of our culture. And that means
it has to be a part of your calendar, right? And the way that your team serves the community
throughout the year, I think pays dividends back to that culture. But I think the biggest
difference is being intentional about it ahead of time versus not having a plan and then just
reacting, which I think you'll probably have less impact if you're not as intentional.
So we've got the big picture view. Let's break it down to sort of the shop level view.
Sure. What would you recommend would be the simplest way for like a one to two location
shop to start giving? Start small, stay consistent. So I would say you pick one cause that you
genuinely care about and commit to showing up for it over time. That consistency matters,
I think, more than the size of the gift. And I think that the intentionality of that, it becomes
important to that team and they have some ownership in it, right? And I think that pays dividends
beyond the impact they can have in the community. Again, I think it goes back to your culture and
your team mindset and the morale. What's a common mistake you see people make when it comes to
charitable giving? Treating it maybe just like a marketing campaign instead of relationship or
authentic, you know, genuine care to give to the community. I think people can tell the difference.
And not to say that you wouldn't put it in a marketing campaign or utilize it
as part of one because that can have great dividends. But I think just trying to be authentic
is possible. So how would a shop go about choosing the right cause for them? And am I answering my
own question and saying, should you start with something that is close to home or mean something?
I think so. I think you have the nail in the head. You choose something that means something to your
team, something that they can connect to. And sometimes, you know, that takes a little bit
education and a little bit of nudging. You know, generally people I think like to help others,
but you got to help them understand the why. So I think you start with the why and ideally if you
can get something local to them that means something to them, you know, authenticity, I think is
always going to have more impact than in chasing what's popular or reacting to, you know, something
that just randomly comes up like we talked about. Have you noticed any impact on employee retention?
Yeah, yeah. And we use the word team member in our company. We don't use employee. And I think we
have. We give certain amounts of the stores to participate locally. And then we have, like we
have a national serve day that we put out across the entire franchise system, right in October.
And so we really see it's fun locally. I'm in Tampa, Florida. And so we've got, you know,
a dozen or so stores that might drive in for this here corporate stores. And you get to see some of
the same faces over and over. And you can really see the joy of just giving back, but also the
unity that comes with community, right? And so I think you can see a difference. It's hard to measure
sometimes, but it's great to capture in a video form and put that out there to encourage others.
Hey, this is great, right? It's great. It's great to give back.
Does it help with hiring at all? Have you noticed?
I think so. Yeah. So we focus heavily on creating a value driven experience across 33 areas.
Our culture, our customers and community. And so we have a graphic that we show that that is
basically a cycle that keeps on giving. So we start with trying to build a value driven culture,
which is going to impact your customers and generate a value driven customer experience.
When you do that, you're actually going to impact the community. But we also believe that you should
be giving financially. You should be lending your time, talent and treasure. And we believe when you
do that, it actually comes back full circle and impacts that culture. And so that's the existing
team members. When we tell that story and we share what's important to us in our recruiting and in
our messaging, we think you start to attract people that also care about that. And so you've got
like minded people helping instill those values in that culture. So it's kind of the gift that
keeps on giving if you will. So you're talking a little bit about going back to where we started
was on the fact that you don't want it to feel self serving. So how do you promote giving
without making it feel self serving? Yeah, that's a tough line because you want to be authentic.
And so you want to appear authentic. You know, I think you have to make the cause,
the hero, right? Not the company. Tell the story of the people you're helping, not how great the
business is. And so we do things in breast cancer awareness month with where fighters and survivors,
right? You can nominate them to win this kind of VIP fighter survivor package where they're
getting treated like, you know, the queens and princesses they are in a midst of a struggle.
And so you can people are nominating people in and I'll tell you a tears roll and then those come
in and something else because it's hard to always pick one. But you're celebrating them and recognizing
what they're going through. While also we're donating to a cause at the same time. And so
we do that with teachers and, you know, Mother's Day, Father's Day. And so anytime we can shine a
light on our deserving customers or potential customers, they ultimately win. But I think the
company wins along with it. Is there anyone in particular that you feel like drives the most
engagement? You've got such an array of them across the board. I'll tell you, we've done
really well as far as people nominating others with Mother's Day and Father's Day. So Mother's
Day, we give away a car. I think to date, our company has given away over 20 vehicles. The idea
came from a franchise of ours, David, who was inspired by his single mom, you know, growing up
and that he was excited to buy her a car. And so I think he's given away a dozen and we've given
away a dozen. I mean, that was always people want to win a car, but they get to nominate their mom
or a deserving mom. And we just gave away a truck for Father's Day. That video is on our YouTube
channel. I think we just posted it a really just special moment. The family's crying and,
you know, the stories that you hear from it. So those two do pretty well. Teacher,
giveaway, I mean, there's a lot. It's hard to kind of pick your favorites. Like,
pick your favorite child, but the moms probably win as they should.
It's interesting because you've taken, as you said, just sporadic giving and turned it into
sort of a repeatable process. Sure. So what makes a charitable program scalable?
So I think it's the, you start with the intentionality. And for our sake, on a franchise or like
our goal is to always build something into a system and a process that's scalable is replicable.
Right. And so although you don't want it to appear like, Hey, this is just a marketing campaign,
we do kind of treat it like that on the back end, as far as the organization, you know,
putting in the legwork to say, here's the resources you have, and here's the assets and all those
kind of things. So it's kind of packaging it up and making it simple for the shops at the funnel
that's going to impact the local community. Just making it easy for them to participate,
plug in and promote. So let's talk about that. How do you create systems that make it easy to
plug in, promote? What kinds of systems are you putting in place that are going to help your
franchisees execute this vision? Yeah. The goal is to make it as seamless as possible to
remove as much friction as possible. Right. That's a franchise or as John, I use the term
make the gray black and white, right? So the more, the more you can define the black and white,
the less gray you'll get and the bigger impact you have. So we provide the marketing, the timelines,
resources, partnerships so that franchisees can really focus on building the relationships.
And all that, of course, is in a resource center that they can just plug downloaded.
And we actually have a team member dedicated, Michelle, she's amazing.
And she's got a couple other jobs, but one of them is over our community outreach. And so she's,
you know, the bat phone away of, Hey, Michelle, how do we do this? You know, and the team does
an amazing job of supporting franchisees make it look easy. A lot of work goes into making it look
easy for them, right? So yeah, it sounds like you've got your round charitable giving going.
How do you avoid that initiative fatigue over time? That's a really good question.
I think it goes back to what we talked about earlier, being authentic. You know, I think if
you treat it like it's just a marketing program, you treat it like it's just a checkbox, then I
think it's just one more thing that corporate is telling you to do, right? But when you live it,
when you breathe it, when you believe in it, you're excited about it. And when you talk about it,
you're excited about it, right? And hopefully back to your retention question, hiring question,
you're hiring people that are excited about it. And so I think those things help. You
can't stop talking about it. You got to keep promoting it. I do think you have to tell the
story, right? We invest in filming those things and capturing stories and putting
them back out. So I do think that's important, right? You're investing in everything up to it,
then make sure you capture it and tell that story of the deserving winner. But also, hey,
here's the impact that what you do every day had, but we're taking the money that you're helping make,
and here's what we get to do with it. I think that helps. So if there are workshop owners out
there who might still be a little bit skeptical about how much time to devote to this and is it
going to, you know, move the needle for me, what's the clearest business case for structured giving?
In your opinion? Well, I think I would tell them do it and start it because it's the right reason,
right? You do it because it's the right thing to do. The business benefits usually follow,
and I would tell you people are watching you, right? If your question is talking about to the
owners or the operators, I would tell them people watch, you got to do what you say, right? We
believe, we call our owners and operators mentors because we believe they should be the ultimate
guide of how the company flows. And there we have three things, words attached to
every major role in our company. And the three words we've attached to the mentors, you know,
as operators is lead, you must lead by example, lend back to you must lend your time talent and
treasure in legacy. You should be building a legacy that's worth repeating. And so when you're
focused on that and you're putting in the work to do it, you're putting the emphasis and carving
out time to build the structure, everything else will follow. You're going to start to hire and
attract the like minded people and you're going to start to build that value driven culture,
customer experience, and ultimately leave an impact on your community. And we believe the
communities when ultimately the business and your team members when as well. So to put it
bluntly for a shop owner who says this won't move the needle, what would you say back? I tell them
that's the wrong reason to do it. Do it because it's the right thing to do. Right? I like this
benefits usually follow. If you're doing it just to move the needle, A, you're going to be frustrated,
B, it's not going to be authentic. And C, nobody's going to want to get on board with it. Right?
So I would encourage that person to have a little bit of a heart change. You're sitting in that role
because someone impacted your life. Somebody along the way gave to something or someone,
they lent their time talent and treasure to allow you to be in that seat. It's your responsibility
to now give that back to somebody else. Right? And for me, I live my life by the mantra of I
want to build a legacy worth repeating. And I want to have generational impact on our team members,
on our customers, and on our community. Because at the end of your life, I don't think anyone's
ever laid in bed gone. I wish I made more money. I wish I would have been more important. I think
they asked the question of what did I do that did things for others? And you have an opportunity to
do that when you're leading a company bigger than any individual has on their own. And that's an
exciting thought. So let's turn that into something actionable for shop owners. What's one initiative
every shop should try? Yeah. I mean, I would to give a little bit of grace, like we're a big company
now, right? Cup 100 stores. But we weren't 25 years ago, right? We had one store and we gave back
then, right? We did a soup kitchens in our parking lots. So it's do something. Something is better
than nothing, right? I mentioned start small, stay consistent. And you build up from there, right?
You go if you what we really did that helped as we went to it's a ministry, but a nonprofit that
declared no more foundation and say, Hey, we need help communicating. We know business, we know
franchising, right? We know auto, but we don't know the community space. Can you help us put together
a resource that will help other business operators do this because we just don't know it. And so we
actually, you know, helped pay them and asked them to put this together for us. And so now we
provide that to people. And I'd love to provide that if anybody's listening to this, my name's Adam
Sutton. If you find me on LinkedIn, shoot me a message. If you want to ask for that resource,
I'll send you the link happy to do it. But I think going back to your question, you just start small,
do what you can, ask your team, you know, go to the store and say, Hey, this is something I want to
make important. But I want it to be important to you guys. What's on your heart? What are you guys
connected to any local nonprofits? Is there something around this store that we can go do? And
then I would encourage you to create serve days, right? Can you do it once a month? Maybe that's
too much. Can you do twice every six months? You know, at least start with one a year, right?
We're going to commit Sundays, our stores are closed. So we take that as a day off and we go
serve the community. So I think you start somewhere and you can build it from there. You don't have
to have it all figured out. You're going to fail. You're going to, you know, you're going to do things
that you learn from. But if you do it because you care, that's infectious and it'll pay off.
I'm willing to bet if you asked your employees, every single one of them could come up with at
least one cause that means something to them. Yeah. Yeah. And I will have caution, you got to be
careful with the expectations you set because you can't do it all. Right? I mean, there is a
limit of funds because you're not a nonprofit, right? But right more money you make and more
you can help nonprofits. So money's not a bad thing. It's a great thing because you can do more
good with it. But be careful of the messaging of that, you know, and maybe even the disclaimer like,
hey, we want to hear from you of this. I'm picturing a form. Somebody could create an easy,
free, job form online, Microsoft forms and put that out there. We want to start giving back to
communities. Can you nominate a deserving nonprofit? You know, and there'll be a vetting process that's
outside of our walls, like maybe bring somebody else. So mine didn't get picked. Like that was,
somebody else. But I definitely think leaning into that and listening to them goes a long way.
And they're going to have more buy-in in it. And they're going to, it's going to build everything
that you also need and want to be a better company, right? A value-driven company. If a shop owner
wanted to start this month, where would you recommend that they begin to hit the ground running?
I'll tell you, the easiest thing to do is go to some of your local churches. They're already helping.
A lot of people you've got Red Cross. I mean, there's a lot of national organizations. I prefer
to give to more localized. Nothing against national. They do a lot of good, but they have a lot of
overhead, right? Like sometimes when you, when you connect with the local nonprofits, more of those
dollars are going to go. And so find somebody that's, find somebody that's passionate, that is already,
you know, speaking about this and leaning about this. And if you don't know one, start asking around.
But again, the easiest thing to do is show up to your shop and ask your team members,
Hey, can you help me? I want our company to care about the community. And I want to show that by
actually giving our money. Do you know of anybody, you know, reputable nonprofit that's key, reputable,
right? You do want to do a little bit of investigation. But I think you start there and,
and you build off of that. And now you bring up another interesting point. You know, a lot of
people do charitable giving. If a shop owner wants to stand out in their community, is there anything
you could recommend that might differentiate them? So, I mean, maybe find one family, one teacher,
one veteran, right? Non-profit, we talked about in your community that, that you can give back to
and tell that story, right? It doesn't have to be complicated. You know, consistency, doing that more
and more will help. But as I think, as long as you're intentionally trying to make a meaningful
difference, you will, and it's okay to tell that story too, you don't need to feel bad.
Do it for the right reason. But it's okay that you're telling that story and putting it out there
and saying, Hey, look what our company did, right? Again, the more money your company makes,
the more money your company can get. That's what excites me, right? I'm not a money hungry guy,
but the bigger our company gets, the more bigger checks I can write to these nonprofits and the
more lives we can change. Our vision statement at our company is changed lives, changing lives.
And our goal is to use our change lives to change other lives for the better and then help them
change lives for the better. And so it's a repeating cycle that ultimately builds a legacy
that's worth repeating. So consistency and authenticity are two of the biggest takeaways
that I hear from this conversation today. I think so. Don't over complicate it. You need to think
through it, right? And there's legalities and there's tax, there's a lot of, you know, checkboxes
with AI, chat, GBT, none of that is hard, right? Nobody has any good excuse today to not be giving
in their local community and certainly serving, right? Again, I think it all, it all depends on
what's important to you in your life. For me, I had some great mentors and great examples who lent
their time, talent and treasure to be, but also their community and had a mother that was an amazing
saint, almost fostered 200 babies that came through our door. So I had a great example that I've
tried to pay that back to people that have poured into me and honor those. Not everybody has that,
but you could be the one that is that for the next person. That's what I get excited about.
There's no excuse if you're listening to this and you're like, how do I do it? I want to do it.
Delete all the excuses. There are no reasons or excuses. You cannot do that today and give back
because again, someone gave to you and it's the right thing to do. Your business will benefit.
And I think when you get to the end of your life, you'll look back and be glad that you did.
Adam, thank you so much for sharing your perspective today. We appreciate it.
Thank you so much for having me. Honored to talk about this topic. Love that you're
shining a spotlight on it and appreciate all that you do, Christine.
Yeah, I love it. One of the biggest takeaways from today's conversation is that community
involvement doesn't have to be a one-time donation or an annual sponsorship. When it's
intentional, authentic and consistent, it can strengthen your reputation, engage your employees,
deepen customer relationships and ultimately help your business grow. To everyone listening,
we'd love to hear how your shop gives back to its community. Share your stories with us on social
media or send us a message. We're always looking for examples of shops making a difference.
Thanks for listening to Ratchet and Wrench Radio. Until next time, I'm Christine Schaffrin.
Have a good day, everyone. That's going to do it for us today at Ratchet and Wrench Radio.
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of today be the greatest day of your life.
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